C. Wright Mills made the term famous. Allows us both the ability to participate in social life and step back and analyze the broader meantings of what is going on.

Term

Social Conditions

Definition

The realities of life we create together as social beings.

Term

C. Wright Mills

Definition

made the term "Sociological Imagination" famous.

Term

Sociology

Definition

The scientific study of human societies and human behavior in the many groups that make up a society.

Term

Environment

Definition

Refers to all the expectations and incentives established by other people in a person's social world.

Term

3 Levels of Social Reality

Definition

Micro, Middle and Macro.

Term

Erving Goffman

Definition

Studied the mundane behaviors of everyday life. Wrote "Territories of the Self" about the way people use objects as markers to claim personal space.

Term

Macro Level Social Reality

Definition

Refers to whole societies and how they are changing: Revolutions, wars, major changes in the production of goods and services and similar social phenomena that involve very large numbers of people.

Term

Middle Level Social Reality

Definition

Social phenomena that occur in communities or in organizations such as businesses and voluntary associations.

Term

The Scientific Method

Definition

Repeated observation, careful description and the formulation of theories based on possible explanations, and the gathering of additional data about questions arising from those theories.

Term

August Comte

Definition

French philosopher who coined the term "sociology." Referred to it as the "Queen of Sciences." Made soem of the earliest attempts to apply scientific methods to the study of social life.

Term

Three most influential social theorists of the 19th Century:

Definition

Karl Marx, Emile Durkheim and Max Weber.

Term

Karl Marx

Definition

Wrote Capital, a detailed study of the rise of capitalism as a dominant system of production. Set forth an extremely powerful theory to explain the transformation taking place as societies became more industrialized and urbanized. Devoted most of his time to the Socialist movement.

Term

Emile Durkheim

Definition

Founder of Scientific sociology in France. his best known books are "The Division of Labor in Society," "Rules of the Sociological Method," and "Suicide," which were pioneering examples of the use of comoparative data to asess the dirctions and consequences of social change. Established the first scientific journal in sociology, "L'Annee Sociologique."

Term

Utilitarianism

Definition

Also called Exchange Theory. Focuses on what people seem to be getting out of their interactions and what they in turn are contributing to the relationship or larger group.

Term

Symbolic Interactionism

Definition

Something Goffman studied. Calls attention to the mundane acts of social communication in everyday life, the choices people make and how others respond to those acts and choices.

Term

Functionalism

Definition

Asks how society manages to carry out the functions it must perform in order to maintain social order, feed large masses of people each day, defend itself against attackers, produce the next generation and so on.

Term

Conflict Theory

Definition

Associated with Karl Marx and his theory of an eventual civil uprising against capitalism. Holds that power is just as important as shared values in holding society together.

Term

Power

Definition

The ability of an individual or group to change the behavior of others.

Term

Robert Park and Ernest Burgess

Definition

Led the University of Chicago's sociology department, the oldest in the nation. Park liked to use the city as a "social laboratory." Park noted in an essay that industrialization causes the breakdown of traditional primary group attachments (those of family members, age-mates or clans).

Term

Human Ecology

Definition

An element of the Chicago School. Emphasized relatioships among social order, social disorganization and the distribution of populations in space and time.

Term

Interactionism

Definition

The sociological perspective that views social order and change as resulting from all the immense variety of repeated interactions among individuals and groups.

Term

Max Weber

Definition

Saw and described the rise of modern science and the jurisprudence and the modern ways of doing business.